Rio Grande Valley Vipers score first jersey sponsorship deal

Fresh off winning the team’s first league championship, the affiliate of the Houston Rockets has become the first National Basketball Association Development League team to sign a jersey sponsorship deal.

Starting next season, the Vipers will sport the Lone Star National Bank logo beneath the numbers on their uniform fronts.

Edna De Saro of the McAllen-based bank says Lone Star and the Vipers make a good fit.

“We’ve been a part of the Vipers for the last three seasons,” says De Saro. “We’re a locally owned, independent, community bank in the Valley. It makes good sense for us to team up with a Valley team.”

As the title sponsor since the team’s inception in 2007, Lone Star was given the first right of refusal.

“We’ve already invested a lot of money, so why pull out now?” De Saro says. “There’s a lot of value. The Valley is growing, but there’s not a whole lot of entertainment outside of going to the movies or going out to dinner. When the NBA wanted to bring a D-League team here, it made sense for use to team up.”

While specific terms of the sponsorship were not disclosed, both sides say the jersey deal represented a 30 percent bump in the total value of the partnership — which includes sponsoring the coach’s weekly radio show.

“You’re always looking for more ways to increase revenue,” says Bert Garcia, Vipers team president. “The jersey has got to be one of the biggest inventory pieces you have.”

Garcia notes the NBA does not break out jersey sales for D-League teams, but says the Vipers led all teams in total merchandise sales last year.

Earlier this year the Rockets became the first NBA team to take full control over basketball operations of a D-League club. A few D-League teams are owned by parent clubs, but the Rockets allow the Vipers to operate as an independent business, only controlling the player and coaching staff personnel.

Garcia says the response in the Valley has been far more positive than negative, in part because of how well the two brands fit together on the uniform.

“It looks nicer than even I had imagined,” he says.

Talks on the jersey deal started late last year and then ramped up in early 2010, but the genesis of the idea came from the New York headquarters of the NBA — which is fiercely protective of league properties.

Garcia says word came down to run the same pick-and-roll sponsorship play as the Women’s National Basketball Association.

“The NBA said to try the same approach as the WNBA,” Garcia says. “So teams had the choice to go ahead and run with this — and we just did.”

Garcia, De Saro and others were in New York recently to meet with league officials, and De Saro says Commissioner David Stern was very excited about the new project.

The NBA has remained mum on bringing jersey sponsorships to regular league play, which has been fairly common in professional foreign leagues and soccer, and has become increasingly popular in tennis and golf.

Says Garcia: “Anything is possible. At the end of the day the NBA is going to ask itself if it’s something the fans want.”